Michelangelo Theme and Variations

Attention your attention please, bus now boarding in bay three, bus boarding in bay three, for Sacramento, Oklahoma, Death Valley, Arkansas, Delhi, Arcadia, Arcady, New Delhi, Ontario Delhi, Jamaica, Barrie, Bala, Heaven's Gate, Scarborough, Brooklin, Brooklyn, Gormenghast, Paris, Mongolia, Jones Street, Basement, Judique, Lagos, Mabou, Tuscaloosa, Shangri-La, Anaheim, Heaven, Hell, Tulsa, Destiny, Paradise,New Glasgow, Portland, Florence, Bottom-of-Glass, Thule, Rome, Aldebaran, Africa, Oslo, Moscow, 221B Baker Street, Salem's Lot, Pottersville, New York City, Mariposa, Orillia, Vancouver, Turkey, Calgary, Muckanaghederdauhaulia, the House of Lancaster, the Hebrides, London, Iceland, Greenland, Dartmouth, Ottawa, Dickens, Chaucer, Beethoven, Florida, Stolo, Economics, Politics, History, Hades, Koss, Apple, Chrysler, Shoefall, New South Wales, Machu Picchu, Dune, the End of the Road, the Next Township, Belbec, the Depths, Hungary, Venice, Miami Beach, the Shire, Tannersby, the Book of Kells, Heart, Budapest, Coffee, Tea, Me, Petawawa, Abdekal, Louisville, King Street, Queen Street, Mexico City, Tulsa, Las Vegas, Berlin, Munich, Singers, Painters, Lodz, Red, Yellow, Blue, Dundas Street, Bay Street, Dovercourt, Hallam, Logan, Gerrard Street, London again, the Internet, Cuzco, the Internet of Things, Cuba, the aorta, the brain, the lungs, the guts, Peru, Mongolia, Australia, Jupiter, Saturn, Detroit, Buffalo, Sarasota, Dubuque, Los Angeles, Tara, Oz, Zabriskie, and Bataslava. All aboard."

 

*

Michelangelo Variations

 

The boy came to my room tonight. He is getting more and more uncannily human every day. I am almost fooled; tomorrow night, I may be completely fooled.

"Geppetto," he breathily whispered. I had not programmed him to whisper breathily. He must have learned it from one of my other creations. "I'm lonely. Please don't make me leave. I'll do anything you want."

He is a fast learner. He didn't wait my response. He slipped in bed beside me, passing his left arm and leg across my chest.

I said, "I was rather drunk when I made you, you realize."

"In vino veritas," he whispered. He sounded like a sigh. He laughed. "How's my little Latin?"

"It's good Latin," I said.

"What's it feel like, getting drunk?" He knee was gently sliding up and down over my lower ribs. "What's it feel like?"

I sighed, genuinely. "You get light-headed. You feel things more deeply. You get silly, you get not so self-conscious."

He frowned. "I don't like that."

"Don't like what?"

He moved his leg away; his foot was no longer caressing me; I felt his simulated frown. He said:

"I don't like that you can be self-conscious at all."

 

My monster said to me, "I will be with you on your wedding night," and I believed him because I knew he was not made to lie.

I feared marriage therefore but as time proceeded to tick sickly from future to past I eased myself in complacency and betrothed Elizabeth. The monster, I mostly reasoned and believed, was frozen in Antarctica.

And yet! and yet! still, on the wedding night, so fearful was I that I had difficulty, though with my bridge before me buxom and beautiful, in maintaining what vulgarians call good wood. As I stood before her bemused gaze, pulling and twisting and shaking and rubbing my super-saturated cactus, there came a knock at the window. I returned my self to my drawers and went to the window. Of course, it was he.

He smiled crookedly at me. "Victor. I am what you want."

Under a strange hypnosis I said, "I made you. I lacked you."

I looked over to Elizabeth. She appeared to understand the situation completely.

I led the monster to Elizabeth. She put her hands on its shoulders.

And I thought: Did I know things would end this way? Is this what life is for?

 

"Dear Penthouse Forum. I never believed it would happen to me. For a couple years I had been lusting after my wife's sister. My wife's sister, understand, began her adult life as one of those hot cheerleader types and stayed as one of those hot cheerleader types. Always happy, always damn sexy. So last weekend we got a call from her. Seemed her car had broken down outside town, she'd just found a payphone, it was starting to rain, her clothes were all wet, could one of us come to get her? My wife told me to go, and I was happy to go, not knowing what would happen. I drove out to the payphone and there she was, all wet and clingy, in a phone booth. It was a very dark night. She got in my car and said, 'Since it's so dark, do you mind if I take off some of these wet clothes?' I said, no, I didn't mind, and I tried to keep my eyes on the road as she disrobed--"

"Sorry, Hal. I'm just not in the mood. My mind's on the AE-35 unit. Can we save this for later?"

"Whatever you say, Dave."

 

Being a misogynist, i.e. hating women as much as women hate each other, I turned away from the world and got into artifice. I started by drawing pretty women straight from the imagination, and then I got into the plastic arts. I started with hands, using my own as models, and I got good at it so I started making legs, using my own as models, and proceeded therefrom to model part by part until I had a good sense of how to sculpt a woman.

So I sculpted a woman, a magnificent woman, from my own imagination. And howdy boy did she ever look hot! But how to give her life? I'd heard that Venus could do stuff like that, so I prayed day and night to Venus and visited her shrine whenever I could. Pray, pray, pray was all I wanted. "Make her real, Venus! Make her real!"

Then one day I came home and saw that the skintone of the sculpture had changed. I touched my artificial woman, and lo and behold, she was growing warmer and warmer! My sculpture came alive, in my very arms! And she had a cock just the right size for me!

 

Pris looked out the window. She saw the open pit of the dark asteroid, with conveyor trains pulling out all those heavy metals that were used in the construction of those like herself. She wondered how much of herself was originally here, on this asteroid. She wondered how much earth she was.

She turned her head and looked in, into the bordello. One of the new girls--Kitty--was busy deepthroating a filthy sewageworker. (Pris had already turned off her olfactories.) She looked to her own space, her own bed. Pencil hatches over the bed showed statistics. All day, all night. Her record was seventy-eight in one 24h period. All happy customers still. Pleasure model.

A phone call came into her. Yes, Pris here. Hello, Pistol Pete. A friend? Bring him along. I've got holes enough for three. Special what? Special request. The youngest? We have Kitty. She's made as nineteen. That's all. I don't know why either. I don't see why. Come by. We'll see what we can do.

Endcall.

Pris reached for her oil. As she lubed herself, she thought about it. There's no reason why not. Why not ten years old? It wouldn't be human, after all.

 

"Sorry, pops, we need some younger blood. We'll be auditioning Magi in six months, maybe we'll give you a ring."

The old man said, "Too old for the Almighty?"

"Muscle tone's all wrong. Look, don't call us, we'll call you."

The old man left.

Michelangelo turned to his casting director and said, "What the fuck was that? I said older, not oak-ancient."

The casting director said, "You're so hard to please!"

"Do I have to fire you? Get out there and find me a God! I've got my Adam, now find me my God!"

The casting director slinked out, leaving Mitch alone. "Where am I supposed to find a good God?"

And the heavens opened, and down came God in all colours and splendours.

God said, "You called?"

Mitch cried, "Holy ... You! Wow! If there's anyone who doesn't an appointment it's You!"

"Do I get the part?"

"Yeah, sure! Stick out Your arm like You're touching Adam's finger. You know, giving him life."

God stuck out his finger.

"What fantastic definition on Your forearm! Can I get sketching?"

God shrugged. "If there's anything I got it's time."

Mitch started sketching.

"I created you from dust."

"Stretch out that finger."

 

*

 

The cabin has recently been painted a dark red, by spray, by covering up all the doors and windows with paper then letter red paint rip all over it, powered maybe by a gasoline generator. On the side there's a small window (white) and a screen door. Between them is the stone of the chimney and the (now redder) horizontal logs.

Don't knock your head on the protruding drainpipe on that corner. The water, see, has to drain well away from the cabin because the cabin has no foundation to speak of.

Around the left side there's another little window. That's the window for the bathroom. It used to be just a storage room, and now it's a bathroom. Beside it, around a little corner, there, there's what can be considered the front door, closest to the road. See there, there's names pressed into the poured concrete. Six names. Whose names? I don't know. I don't know anyone by those names.

Barbecue near the door.

The protrusion on this side, side to the left now, that's where a table sits within. A table of thick wood, magnificent.

Here's the closed-in porch. Sit. You can see the lake spread before you.

 

*

 

Crummy Jobs

 

It was a call down to the Holiday Inn near the 401. I went there and about fifty people of various ages got pitched on how to sell these great vacuum cleaners. They practically sold themselves they were that good.

Roofing. We went out to a place in Whitby. First part of the job was tearing off the old roof with pitchforks. All morning with ripped off roof. The guy I was with made a dirty joke about the Lady of the House. It started raining. I was stranded in Whitby. I had to call my dad to pick me up. I phoned to resign.

Census work. At least I knew the neighbourhoods I was going into. Sort of. There was one stretch of buildings, six apartments apiece, on Lansdowne Drive, rear deadbeats there. In the end I made up statistics for some houses.

The supermarket. I had to gather up the goddamn carts from the lot, as many at a time as was possible. They crashed into cars.

Ah, the jobs I had, or avoided--if it weren't for how I got out of really doing them, I might not be the loser joke I am today.

 

*

 

Afterwards we all agreed we had seen it coming; we also agreed we were frightened of discussing it because we didn't want our fears confirmed. So when it happened, none of us were surprised. The only surprise came later when we found we were all in unison sentimentally.

We were flying over the Atlantic at the time: me, my brother and my sister, my parents. Mom had been agitated as usual, fearing she had left the stove on or a door unlocked, such that any little bit of tomfoolery by her children was met with dagger-eyes and wrist-slaps. She was trying to concentrate, dammit!

My brother dropped his ice cream cone on his new pants. That was the last straw.

My mother shouted, "Okay, that's it! Stop the plane!"

My father said, "It's dangerous stopping a plane in midflight."

"I don't care. STOP THIS PLANE!"

The plane stopped. What was she up to?

She said, "I'm getting out. I'm going home. Enjoy your vacation." She got up, opened the door, and was gone.

My father, resignedly, "She'll catch up later."

The plane started again, and we flew on.

My father was right. She caught up with us at De Gaulle.

 

*

 

Ode to a Down-Viewed Blouse

 

Oh whitest blouse, with fasteners separate

Below the collar for three buttonholes,

So made of purest cotton freshly cleaned,

With sleeves (I guess) and cuffs (I further guess),

In colour same or complimentary,

You blouse! You curtains of the swelling scene!

I waited for your parting as a bike was locked,

Revealing on your stage between your pure

White travelers a sight beyond all ken:

I think myself returnéd to that day,

To try to fix the vision into words,

But yet I can't express too clear the sight

I fed upon, a starving folk at glass

Of mighty lords, a jungle beast that sees

The waterhole at which his dinner plays,

Copernicus perhaps rotating balls!

 

Oh blouse from elements you do protect

The residents within and keep them safe

From cold and heat extreme and idle eye

But still allow for chances of delight

When stockings need a lift or shoes untie;

Oh bless designers, bless the sweatful shops

Wherein these fabrics sheen are drawn and stitched!

A glimpse, and then it's done: and time does wink

And all that life is for through eyes is seen,

And flowerstalks do stiffen from the sight!

 

*

 

It is a good thing to change your schedule. You don't lose your earlier one; rather you're adding one layer of complexity to your behaviour.

Be a plagiarist. Maybe the extra oomph of your personality will elevate otherwise mundane comments to a stellar level. Give it a try.

Something wonderful. My mother is now living in Brooklin, Ontario. It's great to see the heterogeneity of vehicles passing through the intersection of Winchester and Anderson. So much life is involved. Old cars, new cars, trucks, gigantic trucks, pulling boats, ATVs, in winter snowmobiles. In the city you miss all this. Just Fiats and Cooper Minis and silly sports-cars conspicuously consumed.

Likewise, the people there are heterogeneous. (And better musicians, but that's another fable.) In the city, everyone thinks the same. In the country's where the eccentrics really are.

Perhaps it's all too obvious or axiomatic.

On Manitoulin Island we came across an abandoned house; rapidly abandoned, as if the residents had fled at midnight pursued by goblins. An exercise book lay open on a spruce bedside table, with the tallies of an unfinished euchre game pencilled into it.

It remains for us to discuss youth and age, and life and death.

 

*

 

Brief Memoir

 

Laundry.

Cat.

Telling Helen what to bring.

Newspaper suspensions.

Walk to airport.

Start reading Endless Things.

Ottawa, then Halifax.

Cab.

Freeman's restaurant.

Hotel Atlantica.

Sleep.

Intimacy.

Breakfast at Athens Greek restaurant.

Up to Summit Street.

Down to record shop.

Atlantica again, for shuttle bus.

Liverpool, NS Sobeys.

Liquor store.

White Point Beach Resort, Tidewatch vacation home.

Salmon and halibut etc. for five.

Drinking.

Sleep.

Bacon and eggs for five.

Walk to lodge and back.

Dog, and poo.

60th wedding anniversary party.

Drinking.

Barbecued chicken etc. for ten.

Champagne.

Talk of Calvin.

Apology for talk of Calvin.

Into hot tub.

Hot tub and moon.

Out of hot tub.

Balcony and moon.

Sleep.

Intimacy.

Sausages and eggs for six.

Into Liverpool for steaks, liquor, sauerkraut, chowder blend.

Drive around Liverpool.

Back to Tidewatch.

Walk to lodge.

Beer in lodge.

Back to Tidewatch.

Steaks etc. for five.

Drinking.

Dog.

Theology.

Balcony and moon.

Sleep.

Rest of eggs, rest of steak, rest of salmon for five.

Dog, and poo.

Goodbye, goodbye.

Drive to lodge.

Goodbye, goodbye.

Shuttle to Halifax airport.

Beer and BLT.

Airplane.

Ottawa, then Toronto.

Walk to King St.

Streetcar to Langley.

Walk to Logan.

Pizza and "The Killing."

Sleep.

 

*

 

The Green Imp

 

Once upon a time, a flame and a candle decided to set up house together. The flame worked as a seamstress and the candle was a barber. They made good money, and they were happy together.

One day, the mother of the candle came to their house, all in a dishevel. She said, "A green imp has moved into my house and chased me away! What is to be done? Oh, oh!"

The flame thereupon got his horse and rode to the mother's house, transfiguring into an ant along the way. He knocked, and the green imp answered.

"Imp!" said the flame who was disguised as an ant. "I have discovered a wonderful tablecloth that fills with delicious food whenever one says, 'Open, food!' to it."

"How is this my business?" asked the green imp.

"It's high in a tree by the stream, and I can't reach it!"

So the 'ant' led the green imp to the stream. Just then the flame became a flame, and the green imp in fright leapt into the stream and was eaten by a shark.

The flame returned to his house, singing to his mother-in-law, "The green imp is no more!"

 

*

 

"When you're out there, be wary of the poisonberries."

I said, "Poisonberries?"

"Yeah. Eat anything you want, but look out for poisonberries."

"Um, what do they look like?"

The camp counsellor who was talking looked at the other camp counsellors. "Any you guys want to field that question?"

One of the counsellors said, "They're very small. Pea-size. And they're red going on purple."

Another said, "They grow in bunches, usually twenty to a branch or bristle or whatever."

There was no moon that night. We had the fire, then black all around. Things were in the bushes.

"In any case," said the camp councillor, "It's only for four hours. What could go wrong?"

Another councillor nudged him. "But Jake, there's always the possibility of getting lost."

"Yes, that's true. Like last year."

"Yeah, last year. I wonder if the kid's still out here."

"Could be, could be."

I said, "Did that really happen?"

He sighed. "Things like that: they get covered up. The owners pay off the parents. And the kid is just: gone."

One of the other councillors stood up. "We should get in our tents before the snakes come."

Everybody stood up.

That's what it was like, Nigel.

 

*

 

I was listening to Blonde on Blonde when the Shadow Kids entered my room at 2:30 in the morning. They hadn't knocked; they never knock; they're never expected to knock. I switched the stereo over to the A speakers and took off my headphones, keeping the volume the same.

The tallest one put his index finger to my Ming vase and sloooowly eased it off my bookcase. "Oops," he said.

The shortest one said, "What's this music?"

"It's Bob Dylan."

"Never heard of him."

The one who was neither tallest nor shortest said, "Dylan. Isn't that a Jew name?"

I said nothing.

He continued, "So anyway: what crimes you want us to be burdened with?"

I thought for a moment. "Sorry. Nothing this week."

The tallest one picked the needle off the record and put it on the paper label. Rough hiss filled the room.

The shortest one shoved his hands into his dirty jeans. "You're such a liar. We know it all. And you're a liar to boot."

"So why do you visit me if you already know it all?"

The one neither tallest nor shortest said, "We read somewhere that confession is good for the soul," and laughed.

 

*

 

Hey, the other day I got talking to this pretty girl in the local library. Yeah, a library. Hey, you look like you read a book, which one, see, I didn't think so.

So anyways, we're talking ... about Copernicus ... and she asks me, "Hey, you wanna go for coffee?" and I say, "Sorry, can't. Doctor's orders. I'm not supposed to get too sexually aroused."

That's what I told her, hey. Hippocrates, do no harm and shit.

Funny thing about doctors. Surgeons. Do they rank themselves after doin' the knife? "Boy, I really botched that one!" But who're they gonna apologize to? Not the patient, 'cause he's dead. So next-of-kin: "Sorry, it was all ... complications." Complications. Geez, who else but a doctor can use that excuse? "Gosh, sorry about the nuclear meltdown: but there were ... complications."

Oh God we all go through life and we make such mistakes! We remember them for the rest of our lives. Somewhere out there there's an old geezer thinking, "Can't believe I thought Casablanca was gonna tank!"

Anyway, I didn't really tell the chick in the library that stuff about getting sexually aroused. I try not to talk to women. Complications.

 

*

 

A cup of red lace with a snuffbox attached

Two lemmings with both of their jawbones detached

Three cardboard umbrellas to keep in the rain

Four art nouveau knights chiselled contra the grain

Five brave and true djinns with ten puppy dog eyes

Six playwrights who drink seven sycophant lies

Eight tubs of blue paint all arranged in a star

Nine books with the covers nor near and nor far

These are the things that you are, you are,

These are the things that you are, you are,

These are the things that you are.

 

Nine socks with their toes sopping wet from the snow

Eight dogs with ten leads and the pigeons they owe

Six bricks in a circle of seven white hens

Five tea out their bags with their oxygen pens

Four days in the heat of a note on the door

Three wrens in their cells 'cause they won't talk no more

Two nuts with no names in an old folding car

One red fish one blue fish one mountain one jar

These are the things that you are, you are,

These are the things that you are, you are,

These are the things that you are.

 

*

 

Someday soon maybe I know what will happen. I will go to a doctor to find out about the causes of the terrible headaches I will have been having for some time. I'll get scans, pricey scans, all over my head. Then the doctor will give me the news.

"John, it's a tumor. Seriously. We have to operate immediately."

I'll say, "It's my second-favourite organ."

"Congratulations. You're my hundredth brain patient to use that joke. Stolen."

I'll think for a bit. "How will it affect me? My personality and stuff?"

"That's impossible to determine."

"Can it be that I won't change a bit?"

"Nope. Zero. You'll be different. How different is the question."

I'll make preparations for the operation. I'll be in a hospital, natch, and I'll write the future me a little note. I'll give him instructions on how to turn on the laptop, open up Microsoft Word, and get story-writing again. I won't be able to describe to my future self much more than that.

Then they'll wheel me into an operating room and remove an unknown bundle of brain. I'll return to my hospital bed. I'll read my note, I'll open my computer, and I'll write

vreovneibmnkelbenb;ehgoi;heogfkdvlfndvkl;nerkvlr;ehgklernvreklvnrkelvenrvrioe;ghuiroeegnfklvnklfnklghreiogerh;iovnerklvnkrle;hr;ohgiorh;egioh;rb;erjkg;fdhgiero;whioghiorvhnifnvkl;nvieroerhgiroeghriehg;rioevbhierovhriovhniero;hisoghrsog;rhsgoerh;iovnrioghiroehgierso;vbhriosg;hreigorhigorvnvlfndlsv;fvnjr;ghrj;ghjfvbjkrtev;btrbvuwerohgueoevh;ueo;bneuo;bnerugneroovner;ngergu;nero;gnerhuowg;neuwgn

 

*

 

Here is an account of a super hush-hush meeting of the secret cabal of public choice theorists that control our nation's bureaucracy. Don't ask me how I know this. I could get disappeared.

A woman said, "We've shovelled it out there so many times. Overwork Kills! The Hazards of an Imbalance of Work/Life! But it's just not working!"

A man said, "Yeah, those innovators in the private sector are providing too many goods to the people, and we're not involved at all. If we didn't have all the guns, we'd be in serious trouble."

Another woman said, "So what's to do? Any more croissants?"

The first woman said, "Came to me in a long dream. We've got to push indolence."

"Brilliant! The health benefits of doing as little as possible!"

"I'll get the science department to cook up some research! It worked for cholesterol and salt!"

"No one likes working, not really. We get them lazy, and we look less lazy. Because it's a spectrum!"

"You should dream more often, E.M."

"It's noon. Let's call it a day."

And then they sat there, thinking about it all; and if they haven't gotten up to do something, they're sitting there still.

 

*

 

The New Tamburlaine: A Novel

Book Two

PART TWO

Chapter Two

1.

 

And what did Whatsername tell Frederick Stout?

What did he need to know? What's need got to do with it?

<digress>Margaret MacDonell defended her friend (whose name I don't recall) from Cape Breton distillery bullies by shouting at them, "You need to leave my friend alone!" and said bullies backed off. That was the first time I heard this particular usage of the word need. Must have been ten years ago she told me about it, referring to an event five years before then. Say 2000. Need.</digress>

She said, "We've been created for this moment. Aren't you supposed to rape me now?"

Frederick Stout said, "I've forgotten my motivation."

She said, "Clarissa. You're Lovelace, I'm Clarissa."

He said, "Right. How do I know this?"

She said, "The narrator's made you know it. So, C'mon. Rape me."

He said, "Is this almost over?"

She said, "The narrator--no, the author--seems to have pulled us out of the æther tonight. Maybe he has nothing else to write about."

He said, "I suspect he's a bit drunk too."

She said, "He's given me a cunt. He's given you a cock."

 

*

 

Part One

 

"By all means, keep your sense of humour; 'cause you're gonna need it."

Before I fell out the kitchen door at David Smookler's house, I was out front smoking, and his neighbour's daughter, Doris Dooney, (daughter of Frank Dooney) came to visit her father. I know her father well; I've known him for almost thirty years. Now he's invalid.

Doris and I talked. It was dark, so I couldn't quite see her nice eyes. Then David came out to take photographs. Then she came into David's house. She sat in the kitchen. She drank some beer. I was like one metre away from her.

She said, "I always found myself all intimidated by you guys (ie me, David, and Linda). I'm the only one in my family to go to university. You were always such intellectuals."

What else, what else did I see? I saw her nice eyes. I saw her hazellish eyes, maybe simply green, captivated, caught. Since we were talking about our interpersonal experiences, I had to say, I had to declare, that I, years ago, had had a crush on Doris, and that it had never gone away.

Yadda yadda, then she had to go.

 

Part Two

 

I told Mary then, with Linda there, that I had asked Doris out, like on a date, a couple months before I met Mary. I said, quite sincerely, that if Doris hadn't been busy (she had been genuinely busy, not saying no, not at all), I would have wound up being married to Doris Dooney. Without a doubt.

I was trying to express the nature of chance. Everything could have been so different. Mary and Linda were having none of it. Linda thought I was being presumptuous. How could I assume that I would have married Doris Dooney?

How could I have told her about that affection that was evident between Doris and me?

Then I fell out the kitchen door. David had taken the steps away. I was going out for a smoke. I didn't go out the front door because I didn't want to risk meeting Doris. So I stepped out the kitchen door. Where there were no longer any steps. I plummeted two feet. On my ass, more or less. David came to the door. I was no longer laying on the asphalt. Too loud I said,

"What did you do with the fucking steps?"

 

*

 

Lost and Found

 

At three in the morning local time, Jim came home from a vigorous bout of gambling with his friends. He hadn't lost that much, not that much at all, so he treated himself with a beer. He turned on the kitchen light and saw it on the table. The green box of 45s that had vanished from amongst his possessions some time in the past--no less than fifteen years prior. He opened it up. It was the same box with the same rips. The same 45s, in the same torn sleeves. How had it gotten there?

Meanwhile, halfway across the universe, 45,000,000,000 light-years away, a man by the name of Jim came home at three in the morning local time; he'd been winning at poker, so he treated himself to a beer. He turned on the kitchen light. The table was denuded. The green box of 45s he'd been going through nostalgically that morning, that yard sale box he'd picked up eighteen years previous, had vanished. He looked on the chairs, he looked under the table. No, they were definitely gone from the kitchen. He searched for fifteen minutes but it was gone. It had vanished.

 

*

 

For a week before I left for camp, my mother was seldom to be seen. I didn't have a clue what she was doing in her little sewing room; she was in it every night, and whenever I'd knock she'd say, "Come in," and when I'd come in she'd be simply sitting there doing nothing. Suspicious!

So they shipped me off to Camp Tomahawk. I didn't want to go really, but they made me. It took three hours to drive there. Along the way my mother told me what she'd been up to. She'd been sewing name tags into all my clothes, even my panties and training bras. "All except for what you've got on, of course. So please don't wear what you're wearing now tomorrow."

The good-byes were quick; after all they had to drive three more hours home.

I unpacked my clothes then. I wanted to see the name tags. There they were: Janice Jones, Janice Jones, Janice Jones, in very nice green embroidery. Only thing was: my name wasn't Janice Jones. Not by a long shot.

Next day I called home but there was no answer. And no-one came to pick me up in two weeks either.

 

*

 

On the snowiest late afternoon of the winter so far, with drifts reaching bookshelf heights and winds like salad forks gouging cheeks, Henry decided it was time to go to a big rock concert. He called a cab and went out into the street to wait for it.

The street was a wayfare of four lanes. The two outermost were usually used for parking, but there wasn't anyone parked on that snowiest afternoon, because plows have to plow. The cab fishtailed around the corner, fishtailed past Henry, fishtailed back and onto the sidewalk, and fishtailed to a stop.

"You called for a cab?"

"I've changed my mind."

The cab fishtailed off with a curse; then a different car showed up. A 1958 Packard convertible with the top down and in it was a woman who had maligned Henry ten years before. She said, "Here," and handed him a pack of smokes and a jumbo bag of Maltesers.

"What's this for?"

"I was wrong ten years ago. I only found out this morning. This is my idea of a peace pipe."

"Aren't you getting wet?"

"Yes. But priorities are priorities."

"Okay."

She nodded and drove away.

I went back inside, smoking.

 

*

 

The (Great) Leap (Forward) Manifesto

 

-Say, did you hear about that 100-signature thing from the NDP?

-Sure, bud, I heard of it.

-D'ye think it's some kind of a Bozo Eruption?

-Nah, not at all.

-Then what d'ye think it is?

-I think it's a Bozo Tsunami With Connecting Earthquake Causing Tornadoes Of 199 Proof Jim Beam Firenadoes That Sweep Across Entire Provinces With Burning Angry Rattlesnakes Within Aloft Spitting Poison Like Heavy Rain Through Entire Metropolitan Areas With Said Rain Of Poison Causing The Earth To Buckle And Split Apart Revealing The Burning Pit Of Hell Below And From Which Climb MechaStalin, MechaHitler, MechaMao, MechaMussolini, and MechaPolPot Who Proceed To Decimate A Thousand And One Times Over The Population Of The Nation Plus Destroy National Landmarks And Treasures From Sea To Sea To Sea Plus Cause More Tsunamis And Hurricanes And Even Volcanoes In Metropolitan Areas And Smaller Picturesque Townships Where People Vacation Yearly Plus I Failed To Mention The Sharks In The Tornadoes Just Like In The Movies That Now In Retrospect Are Almost Naive In Their Sentimentality Come To Think About It Eruption Of Silly And Sad And Stupid.

-You may be right.

-I'm pretty certain, yep.

 

*

 

Five hours before the world ended, Tim and Tina were finishing up the dessert course. Tim was about to say something fascinating about the colours of dawn when he spotted Trudy coming into the restaurant. He forgot what he was going to say.

Trudy looked at him and winked. Tim saw her sit as he talked about the greens of the sky. Tim saw her gesture to him while talking to the waitress as he talked about the, the levels. Tim saw her come over to their table and seat herself as he said brightly, "Oh my goodness it's Trudy!"

Trudy looked at Tina. "Hello, Tina."

"Hello, Trudy."

"How's it going?"

Tim's optical nerves were aching.

Tina said to Tim. "I've known, Tim. So. The three of us are going to bed together tonight."

Trudy said, "We're both a little ... bored with you."

"We had no objections."

Tim could only think to answer, "Where?"

Trudy said, "I've made up my place."

Tina said, "Plush donkeys and trance."

"Let's be civilized. Should I pay for this?"

"Sure!" Tina stood up. "Oh Tim are you too humiliated now?"

Tim muttered, "Two girls one-"

Tina said, "More like two girls one half."